There’s always one player in every franchise who was better than all the rest. More championships. More talent. Even more money as a result of all the good fortune brought to the team.

Sometimes, that player isn’t the most beloved. Sure, they win games—lots of them in fact. But they don’t always win the heart of the city. Maybe he’s surly during interviews. Maybe he wouldn’t sign an autograph unless you paid him. Maybe he doesn’t smile and when the season’s over, he leaves town just as the winter really begins to bite.

This space isn’t for those guys. This is for the most beloved; the one you wouldn’t trade for more touchdowns or tackles. The one who broke your heart when he hung ‘em up. The one you can’t imagine your organization parting ways with—because he was that good AND that admired.

Here’s our list of the 32 most beloved players to wear a uniform of a current team. If we got it right, we’ll take the pat on the back. If not, we want to hear from you, too. Rest assured Sporting News’ NFL team—Vinnie Iyer, David Steele and Rana L. Cash—heartily debated each and every one before landing on the winners and other finalists.

Why him: Tillman, from Arizona State, played for the Cardinals for just four seasons, but he'll be long remembered as much more than a hometown hero. Just when he was becoming a top safety, he opted for his love of country over football and enlisted as a U.S. Army Ranger in 2002. He was killed in Afghanistan in 2004. His ultimate sacrifice is something that should remain in the hearts of NFL fans everywhere.

Remember this: Tillman, on why he chose to serve after 9/11: "It doesn't do me any good to be proud. It's better to just force myself to be naïve about things, because otherwise I'll start being happy with myself, and then I'll stand still, and then I’m old news."

Why him: Neon Deion. Prime Time. 2 Legit 2 Quit. Before Sanders took his shutdown coverage, dazzling return skills and electric personality to other NFL teams, he captured Atlanta sports fans' hearts by playing for both the Falcons and MLB's Braves during the same three-year stretch.

Remember this: Sanders, just like in MLB, played for five franchises, moving to the 49ers, Cowboys, Redskins and Ravens after his fine start with the Falcons. He won two Super Bowl rings after leaving Atlanta, but before he left, he also starred in the World Series for the Braves.

Why him: Close your eyes and think of the Ravens' short history and their Super Bowl teams. You should have a vision of Lewis pregame dancing in your head. He was their absolute heart and soul all the way through last season. He was as endearing to his own team as he was intimidating to opponents with his play at inside linebacker. He will keep motivating us well into retirement.

Remember this: One of Lewis' many motivational words: "You've got to go out and show them that I'm a different creature now, then I was five minutes ago, cause I'm pissed off for greatness. Cause if you ain't pissed off for greatness that just means you're okay with being mediocre."

Why him: Bills fans had more reason to cheer Kelly this past year, when he won his off-field battle with cancer of the jaw. When he played, Kelly was one tough passer, embodying the blue-collar feel of Buffalo while leading the team to four consecutive AFC championships. As much as Bills Nation loves him, he loves them as much back.

Remember this: In his 11 seasons with the Bills after coming over from the USFL's Houston Gamblers, Kelly won 101 of his 160 starts. Don't be surprised if he becomes the face of the franchise again as a part owner in the near future.

Why him: "Smitty" has been a scrappy, exciting receiver on the field for a long time, and off the field, he's a fixture in Charlotte. He's the little guy who keeps making big plays, and also has a big heart, which he isn't afraid to wear on his sleeve, reflecting the mood of the team. He's fought off any rumors of a trade to last as the most accomplished Panther in franchise history.

Remember this: Smith, one of Jerry Rice's favorite receivers because of his route running skills, led the NFL in receptions (103), receiving yards (1,563) and receiving TDs in his best season, 2005. Like Rice, he's showing the ability to stay in shape late in his career. Smith turns 35 next May.

Why him: Before he was Da Coach, he was Da Best Tight End in the NFL as a player, under his mentor, George "Papa Bear" Halas. He won a league championship for Halas before leading the famed 1985 Bears, who shuffled all the way to a Super Bowl title. As far as Chicago sports icons, he's just a few notches behind Michael Jordan.

Remember this: Three nuggets of winning wisdom from Ditka himself:
"The ones who want to achieve and win championships motivate themselves."
"Success isn't permanent and failure isn't fatal."
"You're never a loser until you quit trying."

Why him: Munoz is the best left tackle in NFL history, and was a rock of a pass protector in being named All-Pro for nine of his 13 seasons. He was the first Bengal to enter the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and endures as the best. For a franchise that's struggled for most of the past three decades, he was the fixture on its two AFC championship teams.

Remember this: Munoz was such a great athlete, that he also caught four career touchdowns as a receiver. His son, Michael (football) and daughter, Michelle (basketball) are considered two of the greatest high school players in Cincinnati area history.

Why him: His name is synonymous with the franchise, literally, and many consider him to be the best player to play for any team, ever. As the Browns have struggled to have success in their second incarnation, he's a memory of their glory days.

Remember this: Brown has reconnected with the team in recent years, being named an executive advisor during the Mike Holmgren era, and he was welcomed back as a special advisor this year.

Why him: Captain Comeback developed legendary status with his clutch passing. The best quarterback in franchise history also has been quite an ambassador for the Star, and the game of football in general. His on-field heroics remain close to the hearts of Cowboys fans who are hoping for the same old glory with Tony Romo.

Remember this: Staubach won the Heisman Trophy while at Navy before becoming a famed Super Bowl MVP with America's Team. How beloved is he? Just three years ago, he was named the greatest Cowboy of them all by the Dallas Morning News.

Why him: "This one's for John." Those were the immortal words of owner Pat Bowlen when the Broncos and Elway finally earned their first ring in a classic Super Bowl against the Packers. Elway ended up getting another as Denver made it back-to-back against the Falcons before riding off into the sunset as a two-time champion. Elway is team vice president, overseeing the current glory of Peyton Manning.

Remember this: As much Manning is about eye-popping numbers, Elway was about gritty athleticism and leading comebacks without style points, except for his rifle arm. Note that he had only one 4,000-yard season and threw a career-high 27 TD passes in his penultimate, first title season in 1997.

Why him: The Lions haven't had many superstars during their Super Bowl era days, and well before there was the unstoppable Megatron, it was the elusive Sanders. Sanders put Detroit on the map through some lean years, and brought the franchise some of its greatest success. He was as fun to watch as he was likeable.

Remember this: The fact that Sanders retired early—while he was on track to becoming the leading rusher in NFL history—only adds to his legacy. Hanging it up at age 30, he never showed any signs of true decline, so his memory of his amazing runs is etched in stone.

Why him: Before Starr led the Packers to victories in Super Bowls I and II, he had the Ice Bowl plunge, and many other magic moments as the on-field extension of coach Vince Lombardi. While Green Bay has had a couple of recent QBs lead the franchise to championships, Starr remains at the top of the heap.

Remember this: Given the Packers' rich tradition, it’s surprising he's one of only five Packers great to have his number (15) retired. Starr also coached the team for nine seasons following his playing days.

Why him: The Texans have a short history and Watt is only in his third season, but he's definitely the most popular and beloved of all time. His ability to swat passes and throw down quarterbacks makes him the most disruptive and exciting defensive player in the NFL. Watt has quickly become the face of the franchise, enough to be Houston's biggest crossover sports celebrity.

Remember this: It's been a long journey for Watt to become the player he is now, as he almost gave up football while he was delivering pizzas between college stints at Central Michigan and Wisconsin. His humble beginning just adds to his endearment.

Why him: Manning might be the most beloved Bronco at the moment, but he remains to Indianapolis what Johnny Unitas was to the Baltimore Colts before him, and the tradition Andrew Luck is trying to follow. Just as it was difficult for Manning to say goodbye to Indy, it was also an emotional moment for Colts fans.

Remember this: When Manning was at Tennessee, he caused a spike in people naming their babies, boys or girls, Peyton. There was a similar effect in Indianapolis, and now Denver can't get enough of Manning mania. He may be the most beloved football player of all time, period.

Special consideration: Johnny Unitas, Baltimore Colts. The haircut. The high tops. The big arm. Johnny U. long ago set the tone for the modern passing game and raised the popularity of the NFL. Like Peyton Manning, he was an endearing figure to both Colts fans and the entire country.

Why him: Taylor was just inducted into the Pride of the Jaguars last year, but the greatest running back in the franchise's short history means a lot more than that. He was just the second Jaguar to earn that highest honor, and given his past as a dominant high school player in Belle Glades and college superstar in Gainesville, he was a Florida standout through and through.

Remember this: Drafted ninth overall in 1998, Taylor lived up to the billing and more as the most underrated workhorse back in the league for a long time.

Why him: Thomas will be remembered for being one of the greatest pass rushers in NFL history, but he was lost far too early when he died as a result of a car accident in 2000 at age 33. He might have been the greatest Chief of them all, and there's no question about how much he's still loved for everything he did on the field and in the community.

Remember this: Thomas still holds the NFL record for sacks in a game with seven against the Seahawks in 1990. He also had six in a game against the Raiders in 1998. The Chiefs have named their annual player of the year award to honor him.

Why him: He was the living embodiment of the Perfect Team, the 17-0 team of 1972, and what it was about: bruising, smashmouth, unyielding football. There was nothing those Dolphins did that reminded anyone of sunshine and white beaches—they were blue-collar all the way, and Csonka, the Super Bowl VIII MVP, was the bluest. The quarterbacks changed, the defense was No-Name, Don Shula loomed over the sideline, and two more colorful backs (Jim Kiick and Mercury Morris) shared carries with him. But the image of that team was Csonka running over and through tacklers, helmet shoved down over his brow.

Remember this: Csonka broke his nose and still played. Of course you didn’t forget that. He did it all the time.

Why him: He was the first player picked by the expansion Vikings in 1961, was exiled to the Giants for five years, then came back, still scrambling, and took them on ride like no one had seen to that point. Under his frantic, scrappy leadership, the Vikings always won, always threatened to go all the way, always put on a show, and always made old Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington the place no team ever wanted to visit. The rest of the country may have thought him a loser for the three Super Bowl defeats, but the endless, mad-dashing quests endeared him to the Vikings faithful forever.

Remember this: The best season of Tarkenton’s career, 1975—the Vikings were 12-2 and he was the MVP—went up in flames at the sub-arctic Met on Roger Staubach’s “Hail Mary” in the playoffs. Tark’s career in a nutshell.

Why him: A Red Sawx parallel—just as fans were in awe of Ted Williams and they loved Johnny Pesky, Patriots fans are in awe of Tom Brady, but love Bruschi. In their first Super Bowl season of ’01, Brady was still the guy on a miraculous run as a fill-in, but Bruschi was the glue of the tough, cohesive, clutch defense that really was the team’s engine. He paid his dues as the dynasty was coming together, became a captain and centerpiece—and then came back from a stroke suffered two weeks after the third Super Bowl win, at just 31. His return set his legacy in stone.

Remember this: Bruschi played in his first game since the stroke, in October 2005 at Gillette Stadium on national TV, after he had said he might retire.

Also considered: Tom Brady, John Hannah, Russ Francis

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New Orleans Saints

New Orleans Saints: Drew Brees

Why him: The Saints— the Saints!— won the Super Bowl four years after Hurricane Katrina, and four years after Brees chose to play there, even though the Saints and New Orleans both seemed to be on their last breath. Brees committed to the floundering franchise, he committed to the suffering city in such cataclysmic pain, and he threw a charge into the entire thing (pun intended, since it was the Chargers who declined to keep him in 2006). Someone else might win five Lombardis for the franchise, but Brees will never be topped as the eternal King of Mardi Gras.

Remember this: Brees raised the trophy in Miami, while back home New Orleans threw the party to top all parties.

Why him: Super Bowl III, for starters. But before that and after, Namath managed to face the unfathomable expectations put on him by the Jets, the AFL and New York, and surpass them. He lived up to the Broadway Joe nickname, became the face of the upstart league, made the Jets legit, flung it around like the ultimate gunslinger he was … and then he guaranteed a win over the Baltimore Colts and the establishment NFL. So the Super Bowl was actually a culmination—but once he pulled that off, he and the Jets became inseparable for all time.

Remember this: Namath waving that finger running off the field at the Orange Bowl. If you haven’t seen that, where have you been the last four decades?

Why him: There may be no athlete whose life off the field was such a mess while his life on the field was such a breathtaking package of beauty and ferocity. His personal demons always ended up being forgiven by Giants fans, and by Bill Parcells, because he destroyed the blueprint for the linebacker position (as well as offensive coaches’ game plans every week) and rode the Giants to two Super Bowl wins. On a franchise defined by defense over the decades, he was the near-perfect defensive dominator. Obviously, he couldn’t contain himself, but no one else could either, and New Yorkers adored him for that.

Remember this: Joe Theismann dropped back on that Monday Night, LT came at him and … ugh. I’m nauseous again.

Why him: No team was tougher to identify with a single player, because so many exemplified the Al Davis, silver-and-black, rebel way. But who represents it better than a guy who walked away from the NFL, got booted by another AFL team, then did double-duty in Oakland as quarterback and kicker, led the team on an epic comeback stretch (1970, five straight games in which his arm or leg won four and tied one), and played until he was 48? This franchise fueled itself on last-chance, no-chance players, and that was Blanda all the way.

Remember this: Season after season in the 1970s would start, and you’d say, “I can’t believe Blanda’s still playing”—until he kicked a field goal against your team.

Why him: Philadelphia is hard on its stars, even the ones it professes to love. Ask Mike Schmidt, Ron Jaworski and Allen Iverson. It was never, ever hard on Dawkins, though, not during his 13 years as an Eagle. He was one of the mainstays of the Andy Reid-Donovan McNabb teams of the 2000s—the defensive anchor —without drawing any of the rage those two did. He was always exemplary on and off the field, and he and the fans bonded even when the rest of the team took a beating from the public after every disappointing playoff finish.

Remember this: Dawkins came back to Philadelphia as a Bronco in 2009, was introduced last, and the fans started screaming two players before he came out of the tunnel

Why him: Of all the Hall of Fame players who flowed into the Steelers franchise under Chuck Noll for the 1970s dynasty, Mean Joe was the first, their No. 1 pick in the 1969 draft. He was the first piece overall, and the first thread of the Steel Curtain. And of all the characters that populated that team, Greene topped them all. It was partly because his nickname was no exaggeration—he really was the meanest player in the NFL. Part of it was that all those personalities followed him, and so did those players’ most ardent followers. They all united under Mean Joe.

Remember when: Mean Joe did the commercial that defined his career—the kid, the jersey, a Coke and a smile?

Why him: Saying he was a son of the city or a hometown kid made good, damns Seau’s relationship with San Diego with faint praise. It was more than that, just like it was more than his being an electric Hall of Fame-level player who embodied what his era of the Chargers was about. The fact that it was his team that finally broke the city’s football curse and made it to the Super Bowl only cemented that bond. He never left home, for college or the pros, he was everybody’s friend, and when he died he was mourned like a member of the family.

Remember this: Seau played hurt in the 1994 AFC title game at Three Rivers Stadium, was all over the field (including on the final goal-line stand) and the Chargers shocked the Steelers to reach Super Bowl XXIX?

Why him: It’s impossible for anyone younger than 50 to imagine that once upon a time, the 49ers were perennial bridesmaids. Not after Montana showed up, and threw a certain pass to Dwight Clark in the end zone against the mighty Cowboys. It might be a stretch to say that everything after that—the four Super Bowls, the back injury, the battle for his job against Steve Young, his exit to Kansas City—was dramatic icing on the cake. But not much of a stretch. That Montana-led leap forward forever made them a franchise that expected to win, and one where every quarterback from then on would be compared to him.

Why him: No one ever knows who the breakthrough player on an expansion team will be. For Seattle in 1976, it ended up being a rookie reject from the Oilers, a small, seemingly slow wideout from Tulsa. Then, he and Jim Zorn (who would have guessed him, either?) made magic. Within three years, the Seahawks were a winning team, and in the ‘80s they were not only a playoff team, but an attraction, playing to ear-splitting sold-out Kingdome crowds. Largent retired with every major career NFL receiving record, and was the franchise’s signature player.

Remember this: The 1983 Seahawks went to Miami to play the defending AFC champs and Dan Marino—and Largent’s huge catch and run inside the five set up the touchdown that sent them to the AFC title game?

Why him: The patron saint of waiver-wire refugees, Arena-League leftovers and shelf-stockers everywhere. He was the maestro of The Greatest Show on Turf —and on the day in the 1999 preseason when Dick Vermeil announced he was the starter in place of the injured Trent Green, the entire football world said, “Who?” Also worth remembering: the Rams in St. Louis were a joke until then, with local fans wondering if the departed Cardinals were that bad after all. The journeys of Warner and the team were pure testaments of faith. His story will be hard to top in that town.

Remember this: Warner and Isaac Bruce hooked up in the fourth quarter against Tennessee, and the goal-line stop followed, and suddenly the Rams … and this guy … were world champs.

Why him: The first draft pick in franchise history, and he was synonymous with Tampa from that moment on. Except, notably, during the 0-26 start: none of that was laid at his feet. Instead, he kept on playing like the future Hall of Fame defensive end he was, through the worst of times, to the best, then back to the worst. He never tried to leave for greener pastures, somewhere he could win a ring. He even stayed when it was over, opening restaurants and becoming athletic director at USF. He’s the city’s sports saint, and was mourned as such when he died at 56.

Remember this: Tampa Bay, in Year 4, two years after that 0-26 run, made it to the 1979 NFC championship game. More than anyone, America wanted the Bucs to get to the Super Bowl for Selmon.

Why him: The team that moved to the state from Houston just couldn’t be the Oilers anymore. They had to have their own identity. McNair—originally an Oilers draft pick—gave it to them. It was as if everybody on both sides of the ball was required to play like McNair: dish it out and take it, never give in, fight every second to the end. McNair played through every injury imaginable, shared the ’03 MVP with Peyton Manning and got the Titans to within a yard of a possible Super Bowl win. His murder in 2009 still haunts Nashville and the fan base.
Remember this: McNair returned to Nashville with the Ravens in 2006, and half the crowd showed up in Titans No. 9 jerseys. Special consideration: Earl Campbell, Houston Oilers. With all due respect to what McNair means to Tennessee, the face of the franchise for its entire 53-year existence is Campbell, a certifiable Texas legend.

Why him: Players who spend 20 years with the same team were rare even in the 1980s and ‘90s. But Green was the last choice of the first round of the “quarterback” draft of 1983, outlasted the Elways and Marinos, and tormented them and other signal-callers the entire time from his cornerback position. He was on two of the three Joe Gibbs-led Super Bowl winners, played alongside every legend of that era, was admired on and off the field—and stayed fast until the end. Few players in their history represented, and still represents, the franchise as well as Green does.

Remember this: In his NFL debut on a Monday night at RFK Stadium against the Cowboys, the rookie Green caught Tony Dorsett from behind to save a touchdown?